


Contrasts

by Vehemency



Category: Warhammer 40.000, Warhammer 40k (Novels) - Various Authors
Genre: Death, Drukhari | Dark Eldar (Warhammer 40.000), GRIIIMMDAAARRRK, Gen, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-12 21:49:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29891052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vehemency/pseuds/Vehemency
Summary: A short, or perhaps long, jaunt into the life of local single father Rideric and his merry band of fellow bloodthirsty corsairs.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 2





	1. The Dirty Work of Corsairs

Deep within the star speckled void did a predator crouch over its wounded prey that now seemed to list on its side like some titanic dying aquatic creature while smaller vessels darted about like hungry scavengers. 

Within cramped corridors and vaulted holy chambers did embattled resistance make a final stand for God-Emperor and Imperium, while in barracks and officer quarters were others dragged screaming into the darkness and the ship’s power generators began collapsing one by one. 

The Navigator had already taken the choice while it was still available to her, and her blood had not yet dried as frantic bootsteps of terrified menials scrambled over her corpse to disappear down hallways where light fixtures only flicker instead of explode. Behind them came the ominous hum of small anti-grav generators, a stubby wasp-waisted creature of a metal shell and carefully manipulated muscle growth gently floating after its quarry even as it dragged the squirming dying remains of its prior victims.

Vox channels full of desperate orders and pleas were gradually replaced by musical laughter far sharper and louder than the cloudy static normally allowed.

In contrast to the cramped, grey, dirty conditions most of the vessel’s crew lived in, the corridor leading to the private quarters of the self-styled Merchant King Malloren of the Nabrax Concern was notable instead for the golden walls and ceiling with an alabaster floor that was now scuffed with boot prints and increasingly copious amounts of crimson.

The soldiers-for-hire of the Tremmer Company were good bodyguards, trained to deal with mutinies, six different types of close quarters assassinations, and potential courtesan brawls. They were all veterans of wars of some sort or another, whether gang or civil. 

They were not taught to fight nightmares.

In the golden hall did the cervine headed specter of death advance slowly, inexorably towards the door. The darkness which defied the golden light twitched in its wake, clasped around its body with eye twisting green runes. In its bone colored hands it hefted a massive blade of black and felled the Tremmer men like wheat, their corpses or dying bodies twitching as death walked over them. Ricochet filled the hall with a desperate staccato but nothing stopped the sweeping writhing shadow from cutting limbs and heads free of torsos. 

The last of them collapsed, not from wounds but from terror. He scrunched himself against the door and covered his head while screaming prayers. 

With a soft groan of clunky machinery did the door open up into quarters the size of a ballroom that were richly appointed in cheap gulleyspinner silks, more gold, filthy rubies and cloudy sapphires that lined the top of the walls where the highly polished ceiling met it. Stately portraits of a human man with thick brown hair, a thicker brown mustache, and a heroically puffed up chest hung besides decorative curtains of red. Tables covered in recycled paper, stacked and cracked data slates, various colored bottles of alcohol, and piles upon piles of long cold food on delicate looking plates flanked a massive round bed of toxic green colored sheets where grunting noises spilled forth from the occupant.

“Is this a bad time?” 

“I said to NOT BOTHER-” A face that sagged atop a too-healthy layer of fat turned with beady eyes and sweat dripping down skin with liver spots the color of rancid meat. The words died on the Merchant King’s lips. Beneath him a much smaller woman poked her head out and let out a shrill shriek. 

“Ah, that does not look like your wife,” the voice was a caustic honey as the death-figure stalked closer, blood staining the carpet. 

“G-guards! GUARDS!” 

“Apologies, I had to go through them first.” With a mocking bow it came closer. “Malloren, will you not come out to face me?”

The great Merchant-King immediately shoved his slender courtesan out of the bed. “Protect me!” he squealed as he heaved himself onto the floor. 

Perhaps in what was only a surprise to Malloren, the poor woman continued to just lay on the ground and cower as a sabaton shoved itself into Malloren’s sweat caked back and pushed him onto the floor where a heel viciously ground into his spine. Malloren wailed, slapping thick hands on the floor in a desperate attempt to drag himself away to no avail. “Em-Emperor protect me,” he started blubbering. He turned his head slowly to look up at the malicious skull faced thing above. “D-don’t kill me.”

“Fear not, you have a long life ahead of you,” it replied. It then leaned down, the skull’s snout nearly brushing Malloren’s sweat slicked flesh. “But you will certainly wish otherwise.”

He was disappointed, placing the third wine bottle down on the table and sitting against a cheaply gilded table. Malloren laid nearby, neatly trussed up and left to sob in hysterics while the concubine simply had her arms tied behind her and seemed uninterested or unable to do anything but lay in a ball crying softly. He had spent a few minutes earlier prying the gems inlaid into the wall out, hoping for pretty baubles for Fann only to find imperfect gems not even fit to be crushed into cosmetic powder. He sniffed derisively at the red curtains, golden walls, bright ceiling, ego-stroking portraits. 

It was all horrendously tacky.

Picking up another bottle, this time of some amber colored liquor in an awkwardly shaped glass vessel, he eyed the door as a slender figure in a simple set of modified kabalite armor with poisonous looking engravings upon its breastplate stepped through.

“Rideric, are you drinking?”

“I am miserable Lethim,” Rideric whined dramatically as he laid his hand over his eyes. “I am terribly bored and my eyes are being assaulted by this gaudy mess.” He waved his free hand idly at his surroundings as though expending any more effort was beneath him. “How is Fann doing I wonder? I should have just stayed in my quarters and watched holos with her.”

“I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or not.”

“Only a bit,” he sipped the liquid from the bottle before spitting it out the moment it touched his tongue. Malloren screamed in pain. “It tastes like vinegar,” Rideric grumbled as he set it down next to the wine bottles. 

“Is that the Merchant-King?” Lethim asked, pointing at the shuddering human on the ground.

“Yes,” Rideric looked down at the human as well. “It appears he will, unfortunately, not be making it back home to his loving wife.”

Lethim crossed her arms and tsked. “And how unfortunate indeed!”

“The actual unfortunate part is his terrible taste in alcohol,” Rideric picked up another bottle but found it already empty. His gaze turned to the female human. “Lethim what is Taniren doing?”

“Mathematics,” Lethim walked over to look at the large crying human and pushed him over onto his back with an elegantly crafted boot of dark oily looking metal. “He’s been looking at the manifests and comparing it to what we’ve found. We’ve finished rounding up most of the resistance and have them in their… feeding area. I assume it’s a feeding area at least.”

“Is there a discrepancy in the manifests?” Rideric asked although he seemed more interested in pouring the contents of another bottle of alcohol over Malloren’s sputtering face. 

“Only by a few hundred bodies,” Lethim shrugged. “I believe a few of the newer blood got a bit too overzealous in their… hunt.”

“Oh well. Some of the low archons in New Metzuh will pay for meat,” Rideric said, half-thoughtfully.

In fact, this entire venture’s spoils were to be split several ways. Work-teams will soon be assembled to begin the slow de-construction of the human vessel from the inside out. Dangerous work, so the worn down and less useful slaves would be sent in to do it. The materials would be taken by Iron Thorn and in return improvements and repairs for the Khaineborne fleet.

The actual workers of the ship were going to be portioned out, some would find themselves blessed enough to be used as practice fodder for the Cult of the Shrieking Harvest, others falling into the hands of the corsairs themselves while another group were to be given to Archon Khromys as target practice. A haemonculus of Rideric’s grandfather’s acquaintance had asked for between twenty and fifty two left-handed mon’keighs for whatever reason and in return would supply several hundred vials of a potent adrenaline booster some among the Khaineborne had become fond of in the ever changing fashions of chemical experimentation.

Of course, he also still needed to fetch the payment from the person who sold Malloren out in the first place.

He groaned and rubbed his face in slight frustration of reminding himself of all the work he would be doing later. Meetings would be had, haggling over the finer details, sexual favors and blood sigils to seal future agreements, a few possible attempts of absorption to fend off. 

“What should we do about that one?” Lethim asked, pointing at the cowering concubine on the ground.

Rideric rested his chin on his hand for a moment, happy for the distraction. “Give her to Taniren. Something to entertain himself with so he won’t complain so much about being stuck on board.”

Lethim made a face at the thought, “what would he even do in here?” She absently waved an arm. “Not a lot of wing space, I would say.”

“I think he just looks for things to complain about if we haven’t raided a planet or been back to Commorragh often enough for his tastes,” Rideric shrugged. 

“Why did he become a corsair then? I assume he’s smart enough to know that corsairs tend to spend much of their time on vessels.” 

Rideric was not sure if Taniren was smart enough to work that out. “He joined for the same reasons many others did, dear heart. Freedom, and bloodlust.” He pointedly stared at her for a moment until she shifted uncomfortably in his gaze before he continued. “Now let's go get a look at the rest of the chattel. The sooner we finish this, the sooner we can go back and have some decent drinks.” And the sooner he could wash off the filth that hung in the air of the human’s vessel and return to his daughter. He picked his helmet up from the ground and placed it on his head, the soft hissing sound of the seals meeting filling his ears briefly.

“Come now, Malloren! We’re going to go say goodbye to your loyal crew!” Rideric said cheerily as he grabbed the chain connected to the bindings and started easily pulling the squirming lump of human flesh behind him like it was a toy. Malloren did not understand Rideric’s words, but he did understand the pain of being dragged along the crusty carpet. 

Rideric laughed as the despair, shame, and pain of the Merchant-King washed away the nasty taste of the alcohol.

The massive chamber was an ugly thing. A mockery of utilitarianism. It was arranged in levels hewn from thick slabs of metal and creaking grates that rose six storeys high. The bottom floor was shiny with a pungent cleaning solution that never fully washed away while the tiers above were more like expanded walkways that haphazardly crisscrossed over each other. While usually the chamber was perhaps only a sixth full, it was now crowded by terrified, bloodied, bruised, or dying humans wrapped in glittering cord and their cackling captors watching over them. 

Malloren groaned, numerous green-purple bruises on his scraped and battered body as he was tugged along the walkways. It was a tiny procession of four, with Rideric at the head and the concubine at the back, Malloren and Lethim between. 

The human crew turned their heads at the sight, watching Malloren’s yelling sobbing form writhe as Rideric came to a stop on a wide walkway right in the middle of the chamber. He peered over the railing for a moment before coming to a decision. He tied the end of the glittering chain to the railing.

“Up we go,” he muttered, hauling Malloren upwards with a frightful ease his lithe form belied. Even without the augmentations of his warsuit, pulling around sacks of bone and meat was easy enough for him. He then dropped him over the side. It was a very short fall arrested quickly by the chains which softly clanged against the railing, but Malloren’s guttural scream of terror was enough to briefly overwhelm the sounds of all else and brought the attention of both crews to him. 

Some of the humans gasped in shock, others looked away, and yet others had the bitter laughter of those who had long waited for such a moment to befall Malloren. The corsairs however jeered at the spectacle. Malloren hung, trussed up like an animal, howling hoarsely. A few younger corsairs began throwing random items at him, pelting him and causing him to struggle in futility in his bonds.

“Careful now, if you move too much the chain might break,” Rideric laughed as the ambient misery and Malloren’s terror settled over him. The chain in fact would not break from something as meager as a corpulent human’s struggles, but the railing itself looked a bit worse for wear. Rideric turned to address Lethim when his eyes were caught by the sight of the walkway below. “What’s this now?” He asked.

Lethim looked down as well. The walkway directly below was occupied by humans, of a kind. Thin pale people clothed in blandly colored boilersuits with sewn on patches and carefully stitched runes that clearly meant something to them, since they were in groups that seemed determined by what patch one wore. They were men, women, and children. Young and old alike. Some were holding up those too weak or injured to support themselves. 

“Ah,” Lethim muttered. “I believe they call them void-born, or shipbound?” She explained with some disinterest. “They are born, breed, and die aboard a single ship which they serve as living machinery for. Or so I understand. I hear that some mon-keigh vessels have these people on for so long they devolve into something even lower than humanity.”

“Interesting,” Rideric lied. He knew someone who would find it interesting. However, the holds were nearly full on most of his own fleet’s vessels, and this venture was to be the last before they returned to Commorragh. “Lethim, dear heart, could you begin trying to contact Vitiron for me?”

“Ah?”

“I want to stay here and watch, and not deal with him complaining.” He leaned over the railing, ignoring Malloren’s pained sobs to shout down to the corsairs that were keeping watch over the pale mass on the walkway. “Melyma!”

One corsair, a bright eyed former exodite with a necklace of teeth, ears, and helmet lenses looked up. “Yes?” He called back.

“Kill anyone who can’t stand by themselves.” 

The void-born could not possibly understand what exactly was said, but as Melyma and his fellows approached with blades and pistols drawn they knew exactly what was to come. 

Rideric watched from his position as a spectator of death, his deer skull betraying nothing of his agony-hungry delight beneath.


	2. The Eyes of a Child

She woke up with a soft start, the dream of icy cold nails and an ocean of swirling screaming crystal vanishing to be replaced with the faint chime of the music box near her head coming to a stop. She lifted up a small hand to rub an eye and yawned deeply before she began wiggling out of the thick layers of soft white blankets. 

She swung a leg over the side, letting it dangle as she edged herself more and more off the bed until her foot touched the ground. Then she allowed the rest of herself to ungracefully tumble off the bed, cushioned by several of her valiant stuffed animals. 

Fann hopped back up onto her feet quickly and grabbed her stuffed toys in mild alarm. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” She muttered remorsefully as she placed them on her bed. None looked damaged and they all stared at her with their glossy eyes in understanding. Deciding her toys had forgiven her transgression she turned around to scamper over to her desk. 

Much like her blankets, and the bed itself, it was also white colored except for the numerous paint stains on its surface and the softly glowing screen projected from a palm sized crystal held in a tiny nest of black curved metal. The screen cheerily pronounced her successful passing of the study module and her score on the end assessment. She gently cupped the metal in her hands and picked it up as though it were made of thin glass. She had already formulated a brilliant plan to distract her father with her academic performance so that he would not ask her about her chores. The screen followed as she moved its projector with her towards the door out of her bedroom, carefully stepping over her other scattered toys.

She went down the hallways, all in pale colors with the faintest etchings of floral designs carved into them. Small tables stood with exotic flowers in simple vases, gracefully carved chests of ivory and wood pushed against the wall, and sometimes there would be paintings on the walls but otherwise it was with few decorations. Fann often thought to herself that it would look better with a pop of color and had attempted to liven things up with her paints but her father did not seem to approve. 

Fann entered the great chamber and looked for the best spot where her father would immediately see the screen when he walked in from the set of large burnished metal doors at the other end. The doors were carved to look like the serene faces of terrifying women. There were other doors in the room as well, plain simple doors of grey metal, but Fann was not allowed to see what was behind them and they would remain firmly locked no matter how much she tried opening them. Her father always seemed determined to keep her nestled within his sprawling quarters, a tiny world for a tiny child. 

The room itself had plenty of seats of all sorts and makes, several tall crystal fronted cabinets full of glasses and alcohol, long chaise-longues with gouges in them, settes made from the skin of alien beasts, a massive table of black wood that radiated a strange aura that unsettled her if she stood too close to it. 

Above all of it was a single lone banner with the rune of the Khaineborne on it and long dried blood that weighed upon its tattered end. 

Fann cautiously edged her way around the dark table to the chair directly in front of the main doors. She set the projector down very carefully and then, with equal care, slowly moved the chair around so that it would face the door.

Satisfied she turned her attention to other matters such as whether she really should start cleaning up her bedroom or perhaps get another snack and then nap again. 

Something told her to walk to the doors instead. An optimistic desire deeper than her bones. She hesitated for a moment before she crept over to those terrifying faces that seemed to whisper in several voices. After a moment she realized it was not the faces whispering, but voices behind the door. Voices that she recognized. 

“...well it’s fun, but what will you do with it?”

“Oh I was thinking about giving it to Thyndrak, she loves new decorations for her ballroom.”

“Exciting, perhaps she’ll invite us one day?”

“With those feet, I think you’d probably be more of a spectacle than any slave could be.”

There was an aggravated hiss that flowed into the hiss of one of the doors opening just enough to allow a view of what was beyond. Fann peeked into the dimly lit vestibule where three adults stood around what she thought looked like a giant fat fleshy caterpillar thing. 

Taniren looked like an awkwardly drawn monster from one of her storybooks in the dark, his large leathery wings furled tightly around his thin gangly body, the talons on his feet pressed into the metal floor. Across from him was Lethim with a smug grin on her soft face, and then there was her father still wearing the eerie cervine helmet. Fann began trying to close the door as quietly as she could, suddenly feeling like she should have waited instead.

“Hi Fann!” Taniren sounded relieved for some reason.

Fann shifted from one foot to the other uncomfortably, then she slowly slid out from her spot into the dark antechamber.

A pair of strong arms wrapped around her and lifted her up quickly into the air. “Hello my moon crowned princess!” Her father’s voice has a strange hollow reverb as it filtered out from the helmet but it was still warm. She smiled, her father was never comfortable, but he was comforting. He moved her in his embrace so that he could hold her against his waist with one arm while he used the other free hand to wrench his helmet from his head. Long black hair spilled out over his shoulders and his void-blue eyes gleamed with joy, corpse pale skin splattered with dried red. She could feel the cold aura of a well fed predator radiating from him. Fann’s eyes widened in alarm as she continued to look at the blood on her father’s face and he laughed. “Don’t worry, this isn’t mine-”

A guttural shriek pierced the air and Fann looked back down at the big fleshy worm-thing on the ground. “What is that!?” She asked, clutching at her father.

“It’s a human,” Lethim answered helpfully. 

Rideric kissed Fann’s cheek, then slowly set her down. Then he got to a knee to grab the thing by its lank filthy hair and tug its head upwards. Fann immediately ran to hide behind her father at the sight. It was a mockery of the tall slender adults around her. Its face looked grossly inflated and yet simultaneously like melted wax. Bruises and cuts besides there were strange spots on its face and body. “Don’t be afraid Fann,” her father spoke gently. “He can’t hurt you, I won’t let him.”

Fann shook her head in disbelief and briefly imagined it bursting its skin into some more horrible form. 

“Come now, Malloren, be respectful! My daughter rarely gets to see humans alive,” Rideric said. “Your kind is so ugly sometimes I fear it will traumatize her. But there are still things she needs to learn and unfortunately your kind’s continued existence as a plague upon the stars is one of them.”

The human screamed again and Fann recoiled.

Rideric sighed and let go allowing the human’s head to fall to the floor with a meaty ‘thunk’. “Lethim, could you take him to one of the lower cells, and Taniren we will talk later about those numbers.” Fann found herself swept back into his arms.

“Yay,” the Scourge clapped his hands together with the enthusiasm of a dead bird while Lethim grabbed a length of chain attached to the squirming unlucky thing and began tugging it away. After a moment, Taniren awkwardly followed after with his strange hobble-walk, cursing quietly all the way. 

Her father strolled inside the chamber and Fann immediately pointed down to the twinkling screen on the chair. “Look! Look!” She demanded excitedly, shaking her hand for emphasis.

“Ah?” He turned his gaze down to the screen and bent to look at it before he made a soft noise and raised his thin pierced eyebrows slowly while setting his helmet on the table “Oh! Wonderful work Fann!” He said with pride. “Did you take your time with the questions and use your notes?”

“..Yes,” she nodded after a moment, not liking that she had to admit that rushing through her lessons was not the best thing to do. But after a moment her chest began to swell with her own pride as she looked at her father. She had done that, with only herself for help! And her father was happy about it! It was two wins as far as she was concerned.

“That’s good,” he picked up the metal projector carefully in his clawed gauntlet and walked away from the chair towards the door she had come in from. “How about your chores? Did you finish most of them?”

Fann blanched and looked away from her father’s face to instead look at his sabatons as he stepped into one of the hallways. 

He sighed deeply, “I was going to make fruit pastries for you later but I guess you don’t want them.”

“Fruit pastries?” Fann stiffened for a moment. Then she started wiggling against the steel-like arm carrying her. “I’ll go clean it! I’ll go!” She said, “put me down!”

Smiling, her father gently set her on the ground and then very gently held her chin as he bent down fully at the waist to bring his face close to hers, “let me clean up my face and take off my armor and I’ll come help you. It’ll be much faster that way.” Then he kissed her forehead and stood back up to begin walking down the hall. “Come on, the faster we do this, the faster I get to make those pastries.”

Fann pouted knowing what he actually meant was that he was going to make sure she did not stuff her toys under her bed again (she could not understand why this did not count as cleaning). But the prospect of freshly made baked goods with warm centers stuffed with redsun berries or spiral citrus with sweet powdered sugar on top was too much for her to resist.


End file.
